Film reviews: The Fantastic Four: First Steps and Cloud
A space-age superhero team mounts a redo and reality catches up with an online reseller

The Fantastic Four: First Steps
Directed by Matt Shakman (PG-13)
★★★
"They say the third time's the charm, and when it comes to the Fantastic Four, that just might be true," said Maureen Lee Lenker in Entertainment Weekly. In both 2005 and 2015, Marvel failed to build decent movies around the superhero quartet, but the new reboot "leans into the comic book kitschiness inherent to the material" and winds up with an action adventure that feels "retro cool." Pedro Pascal and Vanessa Kirby play married astronauts who've become known as Mr. Fantastic and Invisible Woman since the space mishap that gave them superpowers while turning little-brother Johnny into the Human Torch and friend Ben Grimm into the Thing.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
The movie eventually becomes a parable about how to be a true savior, but it's "at its best" when it's skimming along on the strengths of "its space-race sense of wonder." All four featured actors "nicely inhabit" their roles, said Brian Truitt in USA Today, and "Kirby especially shines in grounding a fantastical narrative in heartfelt emotion." When not invisible, she's Sue Storm—pregnant with a baby who becomes a potential trading chip when a planet-devouring being named Galactus offers to spare Earth if he can take the child. From that point on, the biggest gripe you may have with this Fantastic Four is that its appealing heroes get pushed aside by its villains. Still, the movie "has enough actor-based charm to distract from its jankiest effects, plus a damn cool Silver Surfer, and a zippy pace," said Jesse Hassenger in The A.V. Club. "For a lot of Marvel fans, it will be more than enough."
Cloud
Directed by Kiyoshi Kurosawa (R)
★★★
"Kiyoshi Kurosawa has always made films that explore the fault lines in modern society," said John Powers in NPR.org. In his "strangely gripping" latest thriller, it's the internet that's threatening to pull us all under as we watch Yoshii, a young online reseller, exploit so many fellow humans that they finally team up to seek bloody retribution. After a first half that's "grubbily down-to-earth," the film plunges into "a tense, exceedingly long action sequence in which Yoshii must fight for his survival." But Kurosawa doesn't glamorize the violence or even present us a hero. In fact, "the only character in Cloud who seems happy is the one you suspect may be Satan."
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Kurosawa, a prolific Japanese filmmaker best known for 1997's Cure and 2001's Pulse, "has a knack for embedding ideas within action," said Justin Chang in The New Yorker. Watching Yoshii's online victims chasing revenge, "you can imagine real-life versions of this grim scenario—perhaps already being arranged in corners of the dark web—in which people pay for the opportunity to hunt down their enemies as a form of recreation." In the internet-tainted world Cloud shows us, "a will to annihilate our chosen nemeses might be the only honest human impulse we have left." Don't expect realism, said Zachary Barnes in The Wall Street Journal. Kurosawa's "unnerving" latest is "a fable of a man besieged." Thanks to the internet and its amorality, "Yoshii has become loathed by everyone he knows."
-
The rise of English sparkling wine
The Week Recommends As UK-based brands give champagne a run for its money, here’s everything you need to know about choosing the right bottle
-
Israel and the Gaza flotilla
The Explainer Activists fear loss of life after blaming Israel for drone attacks on ships
-
The moon is rusting
Under the radar The Earth is likely to blame
-
6 rustic homes on ranches
Feature Featuring copper kitchen counters in Colorado and a 380-acre property in California
-
Steve: a ‘gripping’ drama starring Cillian Murphy
The Week Recommends Murphy plays the frazzled headmaster of a boarding school for ‘delinquent’ boys in this bold Indie film
-
The Lady from the Sea: a ‘thrillingly contemporary’ Ibsen adaptation
The Week Recommends ‘Luminous’ cast dazzle in Simon Stone’s ‘hugely enjoyable’ production
-
Black Rabbit: slick crime thriller set in a high-end New York restaurant
The Week Recommends Two Manhattan brothers resort to ‘ever-more high-stakes’ schemes to tackle ‘huge’ gambling debts in the ‘glossy’ series
-
One Battle After Another: a ‘terrifically entertaining’ watch
The Week Recommends Paul Thomas Anderson’s latest release is a ‘high-octane action thriller’ and a ‘surefire Oscar frontrunner’
-
The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny: a novel of ‘undeniable power’
The Week Recommends Kiran Desai’s first novel in nearly 20 years is an ‘enthralling love story’ set across India and the US
-
Color Theories: Julio Torres’ one-man show
Performance Space New York Performance Space New York
-
The 2025 Emmys: A big night for newcomers
Feature The 77th Emmys were full of surprises, from shocking wins and moving speeches to a host’s charity stunt that backfired